Field
This disclosure generally relates to providing olfactory sensations to one or more users via a controlled system.
Description of the Related Art
All of our five sense act as messengers that deliver information to the brain, which then processes this information, causing us to respond in relatively predictable ways. Within the context of our sense of smell, all odors present themselves in specific chemical configurations, allowing humans to perceive a wide variety of distinct odors. Odor perception initiates in the nose, where the respective molecules are detected by a large family of olfactory receptors. Olfactory receptors have diverse protein sequences, and are assigned to subfamilies on the basis of sequence relationships. These observations formed the basis for research into the mechanisms underlying human odor perception, leading to the 2004 grant of the Nobel Prize in Physiology and Medicine to Linda B. Buck and Richard Axel.
However, even given the significant importance of our sense of smell, relatively little has been done to develop the apparent physiological value of this sense or to more thoroughly incorporate it into how humans experience the world around them on a daily basis. Although some systems and devices have been proposed for attempting to provide olfactory sensations to users, they have proven inadequate as mobile, personal, targeted and effective delivery systems that may be used to alter behavior. Some of these systems and devices are intended for personal use (see, for instance, U.S. Pat. Nos. 8,050,545, 8,032,014, 6,654,664 and 6,803,987), while other systems and devices are intended to provide olfactory sensations simultaneously to groups of people, for example people located in a common area such as a movie theater. One such system, known as “Smell-O-Vision”, released odor during the projection of a film so that the viewer could “smell” what was happening in the movie. The technique was created by Hans Laube and made its only commercial appearance in the 1960 film Scent of Mystery. The process injected 30 odors into a movie theater's seats when triggered by the film's soundtrack. Smell-O-Vision did not work as intended. According to Variety, aromas were released with a distracting hissing noise and audience members in the balcony complained that the scents reached them several seconds after the action was shown on the screen. In other parts of the theater, the odors were too faint, causing audience members to sniff loudly in an attempt to catch the scent.
More recently, the Disneyland Resorts have made use of this idea in their 3-D films and other attractions. The Disney California attraction It's Tough to be a Bug releases an unpleasant odor coinciding with a stink bug on-screen, causing an audience reaction. Similarly, Soarin' Over California includes orange blossom, pine forest, and sea air fragrances as the scenery flies below the passengers.
Other attempts have included systems to enhance the video gaming experience, such as ScentScape, which provides background scents to complement the environment shown on the screen. As briefly noted above, many of these attempts have not proved adequate, being limited in one way or another.
New approaches that selectively automate, including more precisely control and remotely deliver desired scents, as well as coordinate audio and/or visual stimuli with olfactory sensations in order to deliver a physiological response, for personal and/or group use are desirable.